AP: Ohio victim accused her killer in 1972 death

COLUMBUS, Ohio—A woman gunned down in a triple murder last year had accused her killer just minutes earlier of shooting her sister to death decades ago, records show.

Barbara Mohler told the gunman, who was her brother-in-law Paul Gilkey, that she had proof he had killed wife Carolyn Gilkey in 1972, according to police records obtained by The Associated Press. Carolyn's death had been originally ruled a suicide.

A few minutes later after Mohler made the accusation, Gilkey killed her at his home in rural Hocking County along with two other people: another sister-in-law, Dorothy Cherry, and his adult son Leroy Gilkey. He then killed himself.

The documents shed new light on the chaotic final moments before the shootings on Jan. 9, 2012, and suggest a possible trigger for the killings. The documents also confirm what investigators have long said, that Gilkey, 63, was upset that day about so many people being in his house and grew agitated.

The documents also underscore tensions in the family and its complicated relationships over time, which included Paul Gilkey marrying his deceased wife's sister shortly after her 1972 death.

That sister, Darlene Gilkey, was not wounded in the 2012 murder-suicide but had been sick and died a few days later. She had divorced Paul Gilkey after he killed a cousin with a metal fence post in 1974, but remarried him when he was released from prison 10 years later.

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An account of the murder-suicide came from Ralph Sowers, Paul Gilkey's stepson, who told authorities Gilkey let him go free that day because he had children. He witnessed the shootings and then fled, according to Hocking County Sheriff's Office records obtained late last month after requests dating back more than a year.

The tension that day ratcheted up when Mohler told Paul Gilkey she had proof locked away that he killed Carolyn.

A few minutes passed, during which Mohler told Paul Gilkey to cool down, and that she and Dorothy were there to care for Darlene.

"Barb then started getting started again with the same stuff," the records show.

Around the same time, Leroy Gilkey told his father he had power of attorney over his mother and threatened to take her from the house, according to the records.

Moments later, Paul Gilkey walked into a bedroom, returned with a gun and began firing, according to the police documents.

Sowers, who told police what he witnessed, did not return calls seeking comment.

A month after the murder-suicide, the coroner changed the cause of Carolyn Gilkey's 1972 death from a shotgun wound to undetermined, saying evidence now appears the shooting was staged. Coroner David Cummin said the shotgun wasn't in the right place for her to have been able to shoot herself.

Cummin said recently that he wasn't aware of the reports about Mohler's confrontation.

"I don't doubt that he did it—it can't be proven," Cummin said. "Unfortunately, I don't think with everybody dead it's going to come to any kind of conclusion beyond what I did."

Sheriff's investigators say they couldn't find evidence to back up Mohler's claim.

"If anybody knew anything, they took it with them," said Hocking County Chief Deputy David Valkinburg.

Family members said they'd never heard the story of Mohler's confrontation and didn't know what evidence she might have been speaking of.

"There was never anything that we would have had that would have proven he killed Carolyn," said Mohler's husband, James, who added that family members had long suspected Paul Gilkey of killing Carolyn.

"If Barb would have had that, I'm sure she would have made that known to the authorities," Mohler said. The couple was married 50 years.

The AP's request was delayed while the lone detective on the case transcribed hours of interviews while working dozens of other cases in the rural southern Ohio county, Valkinburg said.